What can you say really?
The President gets tough and all that:
Bush to WMD Owners: ‘We Will Find You’
… “We expect other regimes to follow his example,” Bush said, referring to Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi (search), promising that countries that do, will enjoy “better relations with the United States” but those who don’t will endure “political isolation, economic hardship and other unwelcome consequences.” [snip]
“The key here is not just to deal with rogue states but to deal with these shadowy networks … to make sure we know the full story, to make sure we root out all the tentacles,” Bush’s national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, said Wednesday before the speech. [Emphasis added]
Where can one start with this? We will find the owners of WMD? Have we found any so far? The countries attacked so far (Afghanistan and Iraq) had precious few, while many of the “allies” in the War on Terror have many. What was the White House reaction when Pakistan decided to pardon one Abdul Qadeer Khan? [Now dependent on an investigation according to FoxNews.]
Unwelcome consequences? You and what army? How many Iraq-type wars could the US armed forces carry out in the near future? How many could the US treasury afford, what, with all those permanent tax cuts and all?
Condi: Please don’t get us started ok? First you said no one could ever have imagined planes as weapons, and then we found out some had thought of this. Then you told us no one had warned you about the yellow cake crap, and then we learned the CIA had. Just give it up already ok?
And now, a new Sadly, No! game! the FoxNews article continues thusly:
The Seven Steps to Combating WMD
Bush laid out seven steps he wants taken to combat proliferation.
Please offer your own ideas for the George Bush 7-step guide to combating WMD in the comments. Go!
Condi, Condi, Condi…. My favorite part of the O’Neill book is when he goes to Camp David where he finds proposals for assassinations lying scattered everywhere and Condi and John Ashcroft are singing religious hymns together.
This administration seems to have cornered the market in industrial strength wackos. Prozac, anyone? Thorazine?
Step 1: Make friends with a dictator who really does have nukes and is keen on proliferating teh technology. (just to keep an eye on him?)
Step 2: Ignore another dictator who has a record of selling weapons to other kooks and who has a whole bunch of plutonium.
Step 3: Plunge your fist firmly into the Iraq tar baby so it sticks and you have absolutely no chance of getting it free to deal with any real threats.
Step 4: Facilitate the ramping up of opium production in a region where the revenue flow is immediately accessible to terrorists.
Step 5: Call yourself a “War President”.
Steps 6, and 7, anyone?
I don’t know where it goes, but there’s gotta be:
“Sharpen the Saw”
for it to be Covey-approved.
Watch for the companion tape, “The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective Proliferators”, with a forward by A. Q. Khan
I don’t know about a 7-step plan for combatting proliferation…how about a 12-step plan for countries like Iraq to end their dependence on Weapons of Mass Destruction?
1. Admit that you are powerless over WMDs and that your country has become unmanageable.
2. Believe that a Power greater than yourselves ? i.e. George W. Bush ? can restore you to sanity.
3. Make a decision to turn your will and our lives over to said Power as we understand Him (Bush again).
4. Make a searching and fearless WMD inventory of yourselves.
5. Admit to Bush, to yourselves, and to another country the exact nature of your WMDs.
6. Be entirely ready to have Bush remove all these defects of character, even if you don’t have any.
7. Humbly ask Bush to remove your WMDs.
8. Make a list of all persons you have bombed, gassed, or otherwise harmed, and become willing to make amends to them all.
9. Make direct amends to such people or countries wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continue to take personal WMD inventory and promptly admit it whether you’ve got some or not.
11. Seek through prayer and meditation to improve your conscious contact with Bush as you understand Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, try to carry this message to others, and to practice these principles in all your affairs.
My 7 Step Guide for Containing WMDs.
1. Stop giving them to evil, nasty dictators.
2. Get someone to come in and clean my bathroom. It’s a tragedy waiting to happen.
3. Give free samples of ricin with every Doritos purchase. If everyone has WMD, then we don’t need to contain it!
4. Focus instead on who is the hottest presidental candidate. If you ignore the WMDs, they’ll go away. (My vote is for Dean.)
5. Give Rumsfeld a big baggy of powdered sugar, tell him its the world supply of Anthrax, and ask him to take it away to the North Pole and guard it there with his life.
6. Get someone to come and lay some salt down in my Yuppy Apartment Complex parking lot so I don’t fall on my ass. Again. This won’t really help with WMD, but I wanted to get it out there.
7. Have an administration that treats the world community with respect, creates development opportunities in third world countries to help lift them out of poverty, and give everyone twinkies. That’ll keep them from wanting WMD.
7.
Will the owner of the WMD in the parking lot, license No. IRAQ-1, please call the operator on a red courtesy phone? Your weapons are ready for delivery.
Thank you.
Ed